March is a bad month for Russian leaders (or: Happy Stalin’s Death Day!)

Tsar Nicholas I — Emperor of Russia, King of Poland and Grand Duke of Finland — who brought Russia into the Crimean War and whose domestic and foreign policies are considered disastrous, died on March 2, 1855.
Ioseb Besarionis dze Jughashvili (better known to the world as Joseph Stalin) — Chair of the Ministers of the Soviet Union and Supreme Commander of the Red Army — totalitarian and killer of millions by famine, died on March 5, 1953. Happy Stalin’s Death Day!
Tsar Alexander II — Emperor of Russia, King of Congress Poland and Grand Duke of Finland — pacifist, emancipator of serfs, and generally less of a dick than many historical Russian leaders (a low bar, to be sure) — still was enough of a dick to his lower half blown off by a bomb by the “People’s Will” movement on March 13, 1881.
Iván IV Vasilyevich (better know to the world as Ivan the Terrible) — grand prince of Moscow and the first to declare himself Tsar of all Russia — general rage-a-holic and purge-a-holic, a-hole behind the massacre of Novogrod and the burning of Moscow by Tatars, and the murder of his own son, died on March 28, 1584.
Tsar Paul I — son of Catherine the Great and her husband Peter III (or perhaps by her side guy with a name so appropriate it’s almost Dickensian: Sergei Saltykov) — was killed by his own officers on March 24, 1801.